METRIC SYSTEM TO OUST TURKISH FROM PALESTINE

Manawatu Times, Volume LIII, Issue 6669, 24 July 1928, Page 12

METRIC SYSTEM TO OUST TURKISH FROM PALESTINE

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES MUST NOW AGREE THROUGHOUT WHOLE COUNTRY. JERUSALEM. A system of metric weights and measures will be inaugurated in Palestine as soon as the bill just published in,the Official Gazette becomes a law. The Turkish measures and weights will be officially scrapped when the new system becomes operative. The local weights and measures vary greatly throughout the country. These decided the British authorities to issue an a few years ago establishing the metric system. Colliding with old traditions and experience, the- new system was practically ignored by the population as a whole, which continued to express lengths and areas,-weights and capacities, in the old Turkish terms. Tho disadvantages -of the old system were numerous. While ■ a ‘ ‘ dunam” of-land is officially . 919 square meters, in actual practice the dunam ranges between 900 and 1000 square meters. Similarly, a kantar in tho south of Palestine is equivalent to 634 pounds, in tho north it is 564 pounds. Even greater confusion results from the fluctuating weights and / measures used in tithes estimation. A “tabbah” of wheat is in Jerusalem 23 kilos, in Hebron 28) in Nablus 40. s Tho new ordinance establishes the meter as a measure of length, the kilogram as the standard of weight, the liter as the standard of capacity. - Of the old measures, only the “dunam” is retained, consisting of 1000 square meters. A standard of metric weights and measures will be ‘procured and verified by 5 the Standard Department of:tho Board of Trade in England before being brought into use here. These standards are to be shqwn to any person who makes written application for their production on £he payment of a fee. Police officers will have the rank of inspector of weights and measures and new officers may be appointed to act as inspectors. Eor some time at least official cognizance* will be taken of areas and weights expressed in terms now used, the i High Commissioner being allowed within five years to prohibit the use of any other than the metric weights and measures.